


Holy Roller (Roll Over Me)

by cosmogeny



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Anxiety, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Rollerblades & Rollerskates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-27
Updated: 2017-09-27
Packaged: 2019-01-05 23:39:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12199575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmogeny/pseuds/cosmogeny
Summary: Dan feels pretty, Dan feels anxious, and Phil is a god on wheels.Or, the 2017 Creator Summit rollerblading extravaganza feat. social anxiety and a real strong desire to skate tandem with your boyfriend.





	Holy Roller (Roll Over Me)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nihilist_toothpaste](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nihilist_toothpaste/gifts).



> me: has mountains of reading and assignments to complete  
> me: hasn't had dinner yet  
> me: needs to wake up at 4am for work  
> me: *opens google drive*
> 
> Hey everyone it's Rebecca, your local bad decision maker! I'm sure you all know what inspired this fic. But there was a little extra inspo in the form of nihilist-toothpaste so Leela ily even when you make me emo.

Dan’s taking selfies alone in the bathroom. No one to judge him indulging his own vapidity, or to call him a pretty boy. But he feels pretty. The lighting is incredible, and it catches in the sequins and the glitter and it just feels… good. It feels nice, to let his eyes linger on his own reflection and see a shine and a sparkle that he doesn’t hate. It’s hot and crowded beyond the walls of this stark white bathroom, and he’s undoubtedly greasy by now, but the his gaze is pulled time and again to the little crescent moon at his temple, cradling his tired eye. 

He’s wanted this for some time. Glitter and sparkle, a pretty shine. It’s always felt a little too dangerous. A little too personal. This, though. Here. Everybody’s got glitz and glam and Dan can blend in even while he hides alone in the bathroom and tries to get a shot that looks as pretty as he feels. A shot that feels personal and individual and like he did this for himself. 

In the end he half covers his smile, the cracked lines in his lips and the shine of grease in his dimple. He’s not quite ready to post it when Phil appears, remarkably stable on his skates and remarkably beautiful in the hideous pattern of his shirt.

“You’re making me look like I’m some kind of independent go-getter out there by myself,” Phil says, leaning against the counter. There’s a puddle by the sink’s rim from where Dan tried to clean some of the sweat off his forehead and the hem of Phil’s shirt quickly soaks it up.

“Not a terrible image to have,” Dan offers, tucking his phone away. 

Phil comes up beside him and runs the tip of a finger around the curve of his moon, down and across the swell of his bottom lip. “I’d much rather look like a co-dependent loser who only ever hangs out with the same guy.” 

“Scandalous,” Dan whispers, leaning closer, chasing the feeling of Phil’s hands on him. “Uncle Phil and his roommate Dan. What will the children think?”

Phil shrugs and leans away. “You’ll have married me by the time Martin and Corn have children,” he says, sure and matter of fact. He’s walking towards the door and Dan follows him, pulled not by his hand but by his stupid heart. 

“Very sure of yourself there, Lester.” 

Phil’s got the door half open when he tosses a grin over his shoulder. “If getting you to rollerblade was this easy, getting you to marry me will be nothing.” 

Dan uses their bodies to shut the door back closed. “Hey,” he says, slightly tipsy and feeling too in love and happy and pretty. “Not nothing.” He kisses Phil against the bathroom door, quick and chaste and private because their relationship isn’t one that can happen in a roller rink filled with cameras and prying eyes. 

***

The quiet privacy and self-soothing in the bathroom quickly becomes a too-loud, too-crowded, anxiety-inducing nightmare on the rink. Dan used to enjoy these kinds of things. Loud music and bright lights, surrounded by friends.

Phil’s really the only one here he’d count as a friend, and these days bright lights only serve to shine on all the things he wants to hide about himself. It’s so loud that he has to yell to be heard by Phil. Has to get up so close to hear him. Okay, so maybe that part isn’t so bad. Kind of like hiding in plain sight. It’s too hot but still a relief, somehow, to feel Phil’s hot breath against the side of his face, the shell of his ear, straining to be heard. 

“I _said_ ,” he yells, “Last one round the rink has to do the washing up for a week.”

Dan gives him a look. “Why on earth would I make an idiot of myself in front of all these people when I can consistently and reliably just beat you at rock, paper, scissors?” 

“Because I asked you nicely?”

“You didn’t, actually. You didn’t ask at all.”

“Daaaan,” Phil pleads, putting on the puppy pout that hasn’t worked since Dan was nineteen. It’s still cute, but Dan is an adult now. He knows how to say no to people. He pays taxes.

Well, Phil pays his taxes. And Dan’s actually only good at saying no in theory. He’s never quite got the hang of letting anyone down in actuality, least of all Phil. 

“Skate with me,” Phil says. “Just for a few minutes. If you hate it we can stop and sit in a corner somewhere.” 

“You just want to see me fall on my face,” Dan grumbles, but starts gingerly skating towards the entrance to the rink. 

“Of course I do,” Phil laughs, gliding up beside him. “But mostly I want to see you have fun.” 

Dan could measure to the most infinitesimal fraction the distance between them, the empty space between their hands. He’d go faster if Phil was pulling him, maybe, or he’d slow Phil down. Which one of them would fall over first, if they spun around in a circle together? What must it be like, Dan wonders bitterly, to go rollerblading with your boyfriend? 

Phil speeds up a little ahead, blows a raspberry over his shoulder, daring Dan to chase him. Dan looks around at all the other creators, the speed at which they’re skating, the laughing, some holding hands, some even skating backwards. He looks down at his feet, giant and awkward and pushing him forward at a snail’s pace, and feels shame burn at him from the inside out. 

He’s not good at this. At having fun. Not in large crowds. Not where he has to maintain an impression. He’s not good at having fun if it means being bad at something. His mom used to say he was too high-strung. His friends at school called him a sore loser. Phil just tells him it’s okay to have high expectations, but that it’s also okay not to meet them all the time. It still feels like he’s trapped in a fishbowl, all eyes on him, the lights catching on the stupid iridescent crescent moon he’d been dumb enough to feel good about, glittering out the corner of his eye, sweat dripping down into both, making it harder to see, making everything harder, why is it so hard, why—

“I’m serious, you know,” Phil says, rolling to a stop in front of Dan’s shaking hands. “I will burden you with dish duty for a full week.” He doesn’t even glance around before he reaches out and pushes a sweaty, sticky curl off of Dan’s forehead. Smooths a thumb over each eyebrow. Smiles at him. “This is no holds barred, Howell. Pruney fingers are a thing of the past for Philly.” 

And then, like a beautiful idiot, Phil attempts to skate backwards for what is very likely the first time in his too-short life. Thoughts about life insurance briefly enter Dan’s mind as Phil goes down hard, but the thud of his body hitting the floor startles Dan into action. 

“Oh my god, oh my god, holy shit, are you—”

Phil sits up rather quickly despite Dan trying to keep him prone and immobile, wondering about spinal injuries and paralysis and how he’s going to make their apartment wheelchair accessible. “Ouch,” he says. “My spine. And my ego.” 

Dan laughs, because he has to. Because Phil’s okay, and Phil’s laughing, and everyone else is laughing. Which, Dan thinks, was probably Phil’s goal. To take the pressure off. To wipe away the worry of embarrassment. To take care of Dan like he always does, in ways Dan could never deserve. 

“If only I had a boyfriend with big, meaty hands to rub my poor, aching back tonight.” 

“If you stop talking about my hands like that, there may be a massage in your future,” Dan promises. He stabilizes himself against the rink wall before he offers Phil a hand back up. Their hands linger together for a beat too long, and Dan doesn’t try to fight the blush he feels working its way up his neck. No one will notice in this heat, in this lighting. 

“I’d like an ego massage as well, please.” 

_I absolutely could never live without you_ , Dan thinks. _I’m in love with the way your mind works. I still write embarrassing shit about you in my journal. When you skated towards me on those long fucking legs I wanted to fall at your feet._

“You got a cute butt,” Dan says, and takes advantage of the wall they’re beside to slap Phil, once, right on his ass before skating off on the world’s most unsteady legs. Phil follows quickly after, and they chase each other around the rink, laughing and stumbling and crossing paths with people who are laughing more and stumbling harder, and Dan thinks, _oh_. Dan thinks, This is what it’s like to go rollerblading with your boyfriend.

**Author's Note:**

> And there you have it! Another absolutely pointless fic brought to you by yours truly. This actually turned into something very different than I intended but what are you gonna do. I'm gonna dive into bed now but you can find me at [cosmogenies.tumblr.com](https://cosmogenies.tumblr.com/) if you wanna chat.
> 
> Title from _Holy Roller_ by Thao  & The Get Down Stay Down


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